Meet Your 2027 Facilitators
Matt Dahlberg
Matt Dahlberg is a master ukulele instructor based in the Pacific Northwest and he has been teaching private ukulele lessons online for over 15 years. He was featured in the New York Times as a pioneering online music teacher well before Covid made it fashionable.
Matt says the most fulfilling part of his work is helping foster his students enjoyment of both music and the ukulele.
Through Patreon and YouTube, Matt has built a vibrant community of ukulele enthusiasts, and you can find him collaborating with many other platforms, including Ukulele Underground, Rock Class 101, and The Ukulele Site.
Elizabeth Pfeiffer
Elisabeth Pfeiffer is an internationally active ukulele performer, educator, author, and researcher from Germany. Known for her inventive solo arrangements, original compositions, and engaging workshops, she performs and teaches at festivals throughout Europe and North America - and soon Australia!
Originally trained as a classical guitarist, she ha completed her PhD at the University of Surrey, where she developed the Ukulele Technique Compendium, the first systematic taxonomy of ukulele plucking-hand techniques. Elisabeth is passionate about expanding the ukulele’s artistic possibilities through performance, teaching, composition, and research.
Her Compendium is freely available at
Bryan Tolentino
Bryan Tolentino has been known, for the past forty plus years, as an accompanist who performed and continues to perform, locally and abroad with some of Hawaiʻi’s most well known and accomplished Hawaiian music artists.
Bryan’s recorded on over sixty plus CD’s for other artists as well as compilations adding his unique “fairy dusting”, as he calls it.
Bryan has performed and recorded with notable Hawaiian entertainers such as: Raiatea Helm, Jake Shimabukuro, Herb Ohta, Jr., Aunty Genoa Keawe, and many, many more.
Bryan Tolentino continues to teach in person and online, sharing his love for the ‘ukulele through performances and workshops.
Ian Porter
Ian Porter is a Sydney based musician who brings the social joys and technical skills of music to a broad audience. Using the ukulele and voice as tools, Ian leverages his love of music and undergraduate studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music to bring out the inner musician in all his students.
He is also a certified Level 3 James Hill Ukulele Initiative (JHUI) teacher, founding Secretary of the Australian Ukelele Teachers Association Inc. and Musical Director of the Australian Ukulele Orchestra.
In 2019 Ian started the (almost) bi-annual Willoughby Ukulele Orchestra workshop to explore multi-part arrangements using the ukulele.
He is a founding organiser of Australian Ukulele Retreats.